DON'T BLAME IT ALL ON TIGER WOODS AND JESSE JAMES

By M. Grant Winston, Managing Editor

We have all read and heard the stories about Tiger Woods and Jesse James. Across the board, both are vilified and hated. They are deserving of fates worse than death. Elin Nordegren and Sandra Bullock are portrayed as innocent victims with an innocence approaching sainthood. Baloney! Elin married the biggest "rock star" to come from the word of sports since Michael Jordan, and Sandra married a biker: the epitome of a "bad boy".

There is a huge cult of celebrity around anyone famous in our society, such as Tiger Woods. The cult of celebrity assumes that anyone famous is somehow better than ordinary people, and their greatness can rub off on us mere mortals. The groupie absolutely believes this, and will do anything to get near a famous man. She will find out what hotel he is in, even what room. Many groupies will be easy to say no to, but others will not. Eventually, most men who are pursued do give in. Do we really hate Tiger Woods for that? Did he try to resist, or just give in with wild abandon? Only he knows.

Other than famous men, there is another group countless women will pursue: bad boys. Bad boys are exiting. They ride motorcycles or have fast cars. They piss off daddy, and make his blood boil. They are adventurous, and always a good time. Some girls outgrow chasing bad boys who anger their father, and settle down with a man who reminds them of their father, but others never learn. Jesse James is a biker. His ex-wife is a tattooed porn star. The woman he was just caught with is the same. Sandra Bullock is a grown woman, and should have known better. Did she really think he would stop being a biker just because he got married or had kids? Bad boys will always be bad boys. That is just who they are. Nice guys may not seem like a lot of fun, and women usually keep them as "just friends", but they are the ones who make good husbands and fathers. They are the ones to marry.

I am not saying that only women enter into doomed relationships based on their own crazy notions. There are also countless men who pursue the wrong ones and have only themselves to blame when it doesn't work out, but they are not the ones the media keep talking about. All we read about and hear about is women who are innocent victims and evil philandering men who are to blame for their pain. There is enough blame to go around. People who enter into relationships with unrealistic expectations should blame themselves first when these relationships fail.

We can say we hate Tiger Woods and Jesse James if that makes us feel better. Maybe they do deserve the anger people are heaping on them, but Elin Nordegren and Sandra Bullock do not deserve nearly as much sympathy as they are getting. They are not blameless. They married a rock star and a biker. What the hell were they thinking? There are bound to be people who want to tell both of them, "I told you so."

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